📝 Kiosk question: what if the kiosk closed all balanced bills at check out?

I do not see a benefit of closing guest bills at check-in for the exact reason you stated. Automatic close of zeroed out bills at check out and sending of the folio to the guest’s email of choice sounds great to me. Where I can see this getting messy is if guest has multiple bills open for whatever reason.

That being said, the biggest issue we have come across with any kiosk solution is the ability for the kiosk to collect guest pay amounts and incidentals authorization (sometimes security hold) at check-in. For example: Our hotel charges fees that are collectable at the hotel. When the guest checks in at the kiosk, we would need an authorization or charge processed for the full amount of: room nights, fees and the $125 incidental hold. This becomes trickier when VCC’s are introduced, as room nights are charged to the VCC and the fees and incidental hold to the guest card. 

Thank you! And indeed we have already a partial solution for authorizations and incidents, but VCCs (and the closing of bills) are still blocking us from releasing it. We are working on it 💪🏻 and this question of closing bills is one of the pieces of that puzzle.

Indeed there could be multiple bills and therefore multiple emails to the guest, but those would have to be created by a human somehow (either the guest over-split their bills in the kiosk [feature coming later this year] - if the hotel allows it; or someone from the hotel side created multiple bills for any reason). I think that is a pretty rare chance of happening and not a blocker for this solution - would you agree? Because even if it does happen someday, it's not a revenue risk/loss, just a little confusion.

Hello!

We are in the process of setting up a CI/CO tablet, so this is very interesting for me.

I think auto closing balanced bills at CO absolutely makes sense, in fact I would expect that the invoice is sent right away, as we actually are legaly required to provide an invoice/receipt upon payment that contains the “cash” registry entry (also applies to on-site card payments). For cases where the stay has been routed or moved to a company invoice that is obviously not easily possible…

I have not tried yet, so currently we would have to manually close and send the invoices for kiosk checked out stays?

OTOH, I agree with you that auto closing at check-in is not so good. Consider a reservation is owned by the guest personally, but needs to be invoiced to a company. Initially the stay items might still be posted to the reservation owners bill, asking the guest to pay upfront when checking in at the tablet. So far so good, but if you close the bill right away on the guest, it will cause additional work to manually reissue the invoice upon later guest demand …

In general, I think it would be wise to observe the associated payment policy (at start, at check-out) as defined in the associated rate / rate group. Blanket demanding payment upfront might not be fitting to the properties policy, and not observing the setup payment policy at the kiosk at all is not a good idea, too… right?

Kind regards,

JP.

Hey Ettore,

I’m rattling my brain trying to think of where this could cause an issue.

What if the guest had a bill for a future reservation with a deposit, that future bill would technically be balanced, and if the property had the bill closing behaviour setting as ‘always allowed’, would that cause this bill to close also?

Same scenario for the unpaid items/deposits bill, where the automation moves it to a bill and closes it if balanced. What if the scenario is that they have multiple future reservations all with deposits, so technically they are balanced, on that tab? 

Great points! And indeed a part of this puzzle (that closing bills will help unlock) is respecting the payment policies of the rates. Right now VCCs are still pending, so when we got those routed automatically (we're working on it, I promise heh) it will all fall into place beautifully.

Right now the kiosk closes and invoices a bill at check out automatically IF (and only if) there was a payment taken. If the reservation was already paid in full, the kiosk doesn't do anything - which is quite inconvenient, I think. 

Thanks!!

Bill splitting would be an extremely interesting feature in the backend at first. That would save us a lot of time and errors. 

​@JoshuaE welcome to the club! This is me right now trying to come up with all these scenarios and things that could go wrong 😅

Bingo!! Great point, we gotta see if we can make sure that we only close bills that are related to the current reservation. That would be… weird to explain 😅 I'm taking notes! 📝

Good thought!

Only bills for „past“ / completed stays shall be eligible for auto closing!

Hi ​@ettore.zotarelli ,

we are part of the BETA for adding Company details in Kiosk und using Kiosk in all our properties. 

This is a very important function especially in the DACH Region where business travellers usually need business details on the invoice. I really ike this feature even when it needs improvement as you already mentioned. Therefore i am looking forward to your call next week. 

As the Online Check in doesnt provide this feature yet (Hope this will come soon) the guest can add  the company details at the Kiosk only. 

Bills are beeing closed automatically if the guest is using Online or Kiosk Check out. The issue is yet (BETA) that the bill is beeing closed but the company details are beeing added on a new folio. Therefore the guest receives an bill with no company details if the staff doesnt manually move/merge the folios. 

In general i like the idea of closing bills at check straight after the payment. Reason is that guest does often ask for bills already at payment and expect it. On the other hand all changes would require a rebate or changes to a closed bill. So it might depend on the operation. Why not keep this decicion to the customer (Kiosk Settings) where we can decide when the bill is beeing closed. It would also make sense to controll this via rate / payment triggers when the bill is beeing closed.

Ideas / Feature for further developments:

• Managing guest folios in Mews Kiosk at Check in  + Check out before they are beeing closed. The guest should be able to check his bill before sending it and do changes.
• Adding Company details also at Check out
• Split items 
• Managing Guest bills in the guest portal
• Adding Company details at Online Check in already. Guest should be able to settle everything prior to arrival. 

Best

Linus 

Thanks, Linus. All points above are already well noted. I’m happy to say they are all being considered as we try to find a solution that works for all/as many cases as we can.

Back to the specific question of this thread, seems like auto-closing at check out for all would be fine too? Doing it at check in and creating settings adds some complexity, so I am trying to see if we can deliver something simpler, faster

Hi Ettore,

I would think it's very useful to close and send bills at check out. I would prefer that guests have the option to choosing where the invoice should be send to (so either choose the known mail address or add a new one at check out). No closing bills at check in I would think.

Would it be an option to have the choice per hotel if closing should happen at check in? Then each property can choose for themselves? 

Thanks! Indeed it would be best to offer a settings config when it comes to check in. But maybe for check out we could be safe and automate it for all. I believe there’s already a setting in Mews to close all balanced bills automatically at check out (not just via kiosk) - but not to email them

Hi Etorre, 

Yes indeed there is a setting. We don't have it activated. However, for the kiosk it would be useful. But for us the sending of the invoices would be the best, as now guests still need to ask the front desk (or send an email) requesting for the invoice. Looking forward to the developments and feel free to contact me if you have any questions!

Hi ​@ettore.zotarelli!

I agree with ​@Kirsten, it would be great if hotels can choose themselves.  For us, it would work if the kiosk closes balanced bills during check out (not at check in). Especially closing a bill during check out without taking an actual payment would be a huge improvement. 

Love this; I guess all has been said more or less. I agree with most here; it should be per property, and perhaps even based on policy (rate group level?)

I believe most frequent use will be on check out, but for groups (or just a few rooms travelling together) you would need to be able to create exceptions.. 

imagine the scenario of a few rooms rooms, and they had a restaurant dinner that is payable on account for the company. the POS is posting to the guest folio (allowances is coming soon.. i know) but in the event that billing automation was not done yet or whatever human error (as that is 99% always the case) there will be confusion and annoyance at check out). 

Also, allowing people to instantly send out the bill to themselves (and their accounts team) is great!

​@mauritsbots great insights, thanks!
But in this case:

imagine the scenario of a few rooms rooms, and they had a restaurant dinner that is payable on account for the company. the POS is posting to the guest folio (allowances is coming soon.. i know) but in the event that billing automation was not done yet or whatever human error (as that is 99% always the case) there will be confusion and annoyance at check out). 

The bill would still need to be paid, and the guests would see it and reach out to get it fixed before paying/closing and therefore getting the invoice by email - right? So automatically invoicing every closed bill at check out would still not be a problem. Would it?

I'm trying to find if there are any cases where this being automatic for all could be problematic - but so far it seems like check out is safe to be set automatically for all, and then check in would be best done via a settings for each property, which could be delivered independently.  ​@Sanne what do you think?

Also, if bills were already closed by someone at the front desk, there would be no changes and no emailing there - I think we can assume that if a human closed the bill, they would send the invoice (or not) as needed. The opposite (emailing already-closed bills) could be problematic as someone could be trying to surprise a loved one with an upgrade/extra product, for example. Thoughts?

true that; im just guessing that people would be annoyed as there is no receptionist to shout at ;)

i suppose you are right to basically state “but so far it seems like check out is safe to be set automatically for all, and then check in would be best done via a settings for each property”.

Also, if bills were already closed by someone at the front desk, there would be no changes and no emailing there - I think we can assume that if a human closed the bill, they would send the invoice (or not) as needed. The opposite (emailing already-closed bills) could be problematic as someone could be trying to surprise a loved one with an upgrade/extra product, for example. Thoughts?

Agreed! sending already closed bills is too much and should be avoided. Again that human in the loop problem ;)

Hello,

1. What do you think if the kiosk always closed all balanced guest-owned bills once a guest checks out? GREAT

This means that invoices would then be sent automatically too (if the bill was owned by the guest)! NICE

• Can you think of any downside of this being automatic for all guest-owned bills? IF THEY WOUD NEED COMPANY BILL - but now it’s easy to change that thing
• Do you see a benefit in having the option to also close balanced bills at Check-In (and therefore send the invoice there and then)? NOT FOR US. - you explain bellow the reasons

The reason I hesitate about closing bills at check in is that if the guest wants to charge anything on that same bill and have a single invoice, it will be problematic. But I could imagine how hotels that take all payments upfront and do not allow for room charges could enjoy this option too. (MEWS WILL CREATE A REBATE IN CASE OF CHANGES)